James Rollins - The Blood Gospel

The circus was also famous for its vast network of underground tunnels, used to shuttle prisoners, animals, and gladiators to and fro. The builders had even installed crude elevators for delivering wild beasts or warriors directly to the sands above.

Erin stared up, picturing how St. Peter’s Basilica sat partly on top of this cursed place. During her postgraduate studies in Rome, she had read a text written a century ago— Pagan and Christian Rome by Rodolfo Lanciani. It depicted a map of the two overlapping structures—the horseshoe-shaped Circus below, the cruciform Basilica above.

In the dark, the schematic glowed again in her mind’s eye.

If she could get free of her cell, climb up, and reach the outside, she should be very near to St. Peter’s Basilica.

With help close at hand.

With renewed determination, she explored the edges of the room. It was about eight by ten feet, with a modern steel gate installed at the front. No weaknesses that she could detect.

She needed help. Two faces flashed before her: one as pale as his eyes were dark, but always shining with noble purpose; the other grinning, with flushed cheeks and laughing eyes the color of the sky.

What might have happened to Rhun and Jordan in that time?

She shied away from that thought.

Not in the dark.

After what seemed an eternity, Erin noticed a light approaching. She jammed her face next to the bars. Four figures and what looked like a huge dog were walking toward her down a stone tunnel, one carrying a flashlight. The dog walked next to a woman with long hair.

Bathory and her grimwolf .

Behind them, two taller figures who looked like brothers dragged along a third man, his arms slung over their shoulders. At the sight, her throat closed up. Was that Jordan? Or Rhun?

Reaching the cell without a word, Bathory unlocked the door and swung it open.

Erin tensed. She wanted to charge out, but she wouldn’t make it two steps down that tunnel.

The grimwolf padded into the cell.

Bathory and the two men followed the wolf in. A blast of cold air came in with them. The two brothers were both strigoi .

They dumped the man at her feet. He moaned and turned over. A mass of bruises covered his face, his eyes were nearly swollen closed, dried blood soaked his shirtsleeves and a pant leg.

“Professor Granger?” asked a cracked, familiar voice, with a slight Texas twang.

She fell to her knees next to him, taking his hand. “Nate? Are you okay … why are you here?”

She knew the answer to both questions and despaired as she realized the result of her own shortsightedness. She had never considered that the Belial would go after her innocent students. What did they know? Then it all tumbled together. She had sent the pictures of the tomb, of the Nazi medallion. No wonder Bathory knew to track their team to Germany.

What have I done?

She didn’t know the answer to that one, nor another. “Amy?” she whispered.

Nate stared up at her, tears welling in his eyes. “I … I wasn’t there to protect her.”

Erin rocked back as if she had taken a blow to the face. She heard a sob escape Nate.

“It’s not your fault, Nate.”

It had been her fault. The students had been left in her care.

Nate’s voice was hoarse. “I don’t know why I’m here.”

A rush of affection rose in Erin for the tough Texas kid. She squeezed his hand.

“How touching,” sneered Bathory.

“Why did you take him?” Erin turned and glared at her, earning a threatening growl from the grimwolf. “You got the photos, I imagine. He knows nothing else. He has nothing to do with any of this.”

“Not quite,” said Bathory. “He has something to do with you .”

Guilt washed across Erin. “What do you want?”

“Information from the Woman of Learning , of course.” Bathory displayed her perfect white teeth in an unpleasant grin.

“I don’t believe in that damn prophecy,” Erin said, and meant it. So far, the trio seemed to have bungled more things than they got right. It didn’t feel like they had divine prophecy on their side.

“Ah, but others do.” Bathory stroked the grimwolf’s head. “Help us.”

“No.” She would die before she assisted the Belial in opening the book.

Bathory snapped her fingers. The grimwolf leaped and pinned Nate to the floor with his front paws, knocking his hand loose from Erin’s. The wolf bent his muzzle low over Nate’s throat.

The message was clear, but Bathory drove it home anyway. “I don’t need your cowboy.”

Bathory trained her flashlight on Nate. Erin tried not to look at him. She stared instead at the rough stone walls, the newly installed barred steel gate, and the black ceiling of the cell that seemed to extend upward forever.

But her gaze returned to Nate. He had closed his eyes, quaking, but looking so brave she wanted to hug him. Clearly terrified, he still didn’t ask for help. He just waited.

“What do you need?” Erin asked Bathory.

“Your thoughts about opening the lead casing that holds the book.” Bathory put both hands on her hips. “To start.”

“I don’t know.”

The dog lowered its head toward Nate’s exposed throat and snarled.

“But maybe we can talk it through, you and I.” Erin spoke as fast as she could. “But first, call off the grimwolf.”

As if obeying a silent command from its mistress, the wolf raised its head.

Nate shuddered with relief.

Erin had to give the woman something. “The lead box had a design on it. A skeleton and a man bound together by loops of rope.”

“Yes, we know. Along with the symbols for the Alpha and the Omega.”

Bathory turned to the taller of the two brothers, his flesh punctured and tattooed, his eyes hungry upon her. He shrugged off a satchel, pulled free the heavy artifact, and held it out to Erin.

“What else do you see?” Bathory asked.

Erin took the cold metal object, careful not to touch the fingers of the tattooed man. She wished she had something significant to add. What did she know about the book? She stroked the two figures carved into the front: the human skeleton and the naked man, crossed and locked in an embrace, bound together by a braided cord.

Drawing by Trish Cramblett

“The book is about miracles,” Erin started. “Christ’s miracles. How He harnessed His divinity.”

The wolf shifted its weight from paw to paw.

“We know that,” Bathory snapped. “How do we open it?”

Erin ignored her and tried to think. “Miracles. Like changing water to wine. Bringing the living back from the dead …”

She stopped, surprised.

Bathory understood at the same time. “All the major miracles are about transformations .”

“Exactly!” Erin was surprised at how quickly Bathory had made the connection. “Like transubstantiation, changing wine to the blood of Jesus.”

“So, perhaps this block of lead is the actual book.” Bathory crossed over and crouched next to her, like two colleagues conferring. She touched the lead, too. “Alchemists were always trying to find a way of turning lead to gold.”

Erin nodded, understanding the woman’s hypothesis. “Maybe that quest has its roots in this legend. Some old hint about the Gospel traveled up through the ages. Turning lead to gold.”